The hearing aid industry has devoted considerable effort in recent years towards the development of new types of hearing aids which offer directional hearing to the hearing impaired or deaf. This feature is important since it enables hearing impaired persons to better locate sources of sound which may not be visible to them such as an unseen moving vehicle in the street. It is also important to have a hearing aid with good discriminatory hearing as well. This enables the hearing impaired person, among other things, to better identify and converse with people in crowded gatherings, for example.
These efforts by the hearing aid industry have produced improved hearing aid devices with special electronic circuitry and mechanical designs for providing both directional and discriminatory hearing. Unfortunately, these hearing aids are very complex and expensive and, in many cases, are financially beyond the reach of many hearing aid users.